David,

Unfortunately your level of vitriol doesn't help your cause. People come to this site looking for answers and feel, I believe, that they get ambushed. I daresay the number of participants on this forum who are anything like a threat to Cherokee identity is minuscule, if there are any at all. There is hardly cause to subject a person who arrives at this site, and steps off what you deem to be the straight and narrow, to what amounts to interrogation and strip search. If you do this, you are effectively creating the same sort of damage to your Nation's reputation that Ward Churchill has. Okay, certainly not at the same level, but every little bit hurts.

I believe that you have it in you to articulate your point without resorting to name calling: wannabe, Oreo, etc. For many people this is their first encounter (and I'll say what you said) with an "authentic Indian." Witnessing what appears to be an unprovoked tirade, followed by dissection, makes a bad impression. Needlessly.